Although, really, the idea that Das Kapitol can be hard to read (I have read only bits and pieces of it myself!), and the fact that so many people spout off about Marxism without knowing what the heck they’re talking about was definitly lurking in my mind, and that may have twisted my pen, so to speak.

The Communist Manifesto is so much easier to read, and I think that’s a shame since it does not have nearly the value of the thick book. Exholt’s thoughts definitely took me back to *my* college days, when I, as a young biology undergrad, started spouting stuff about Marxism I didn’t understand but a philosophy major took me under his wings, and mostly set me straight about Marxism.

Do not assume that because I have different reading of the texts in question than you do that I have not read them…If you have a point to make do it without assuming a lack of knowledge on my part. I don’t take silencing, or a sense of superiority from anyone.

An unemployment rate above 10%, inflation at or above 8%, GDP under -1%…you know things that signal a weakness in the economy rather than the down of a business cycle.

The world is not coming to an end and people in the developed world are not going to starve to death.

I don’t know what to say about such an overgeneralized statement. Though the scale may not be to the level seen in many developing countries, there ARE people in the developed world…including the US who are starving due to poverty and/or suffering from health problems/natural disasters out of one’s control.

Even growing up in the supposed economic heyday of the Reagan 80′s, I recall seeing a lot of homeless adults and children in my working-class NYC urban neighborhood who obviously hadn’t eaten in a while due to poverty and/or suffering from various health problems.

Its not so much another Great Depression that we have to be worried about, but something rather more like Japan in the 1990’s – a long period of stagnation or slightly negative growth, not a drastic collapse.

It may not impact the upper/upper-middle classes a lot, but plenty of middle and working-class/poor Japanese ended up homeless and destitute as a result of being tossed out of work and being unable to keep up their rental/mortgage payments. In fact, I recalled several Japanese news articles which mentioned the phenomenon of “homeless neighborhoods” where homeless Japanese congregated in makeshift homes and attempted to make the best of a horrid economic situation.

Just because the economic stagnation does not seem as cataclysmic as the Great Depression does not mean it does not have a serious economic impact….especially on the least socio-economically privileged and most vulnerable members of their society.

Certainly, but stagnation is where all “developed” economies end up if they are unable to continue innovating, i.e., finding new ways to grow. We will recover from this downturn with slow 1 to 3 percent growth. It will suck. Income inequality will probably grow and the most vulnerable will suffer. This is what developed economies that are mainly unregulated look like.

But none of the discussions about how “bad” our economy is actually address that specific point. Instead we are only talking about how to lessen this economic crisis and blunt its effects on the most vulnerable. Clearly those are very important priorities and ones I support whole-heartedly…but if the “crisis” everyone is concerned with is the one facing us in the next 3 quarters…then I don’t see the reason for all the histrionics. I don’t like using people’s financial fears to prompt them to vote in certain ways.

Its not so much another Great Depression that we have to be worried about, but something rather more like Japan in the 1990′s – a long period of stagnation or slightly negative growth, not a drastic collapse.

I think this is a problem of politics not economics.

Honestly, the sky is not falling. It is highly unlikely that we are about to enter into another “Great Depression.” The world is not coming to an end and people in the developed world are not going to starve to death.

We have a narrative going around now that the economy is tremendously bad and may not recover. It’s a cloud of irrational pessimism that rivals the cloud of irrational optimism we had a few short years ago.

I’m an ardent dem and intend to campaign hard for Obama, BUT he is using this narrative to build political support. And I’m not a fan of that tactic.

Can he do things that will help people immediately to blunt the edge of this particular economic crisis? Yes. Will he be able to do things that will prevent a deepening of the current economic crisis? Maybe.

Will he be able to prevent the long term slow down of the economies of the developing world, the thing that has economists concerned? Probably not. Doing so requires significant investment in future innovation, because it’s innovation that keeps our economy chugging when we should be slowing. And I don’t see that sort of economic planning anywhere in his platform.

The nerd in me feels compelled that purist economists will usually refrain from calling a recession a recession until there are two quarters in a row where the economy does not grow (that’s the standard definition of a recession).

Ah, okay, I was confused on the definition.

But still – if we’re not technically in one yet, why the hemming and hawing? Why not just say that while acknowledging that we’re in trouble?